


Nothing Normal

by malevolentmango



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Coma, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pining Hanzo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2017-01-12
Packaged: 2018-09-17 03:19:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9301694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malevolentmango/pseuds/malevolentmango
Summary: An accident on a mission leaves Jesse's future uncertain. Hanzo waits."A lesson learned: mistakes will take all of your chances from you if you let them pass by."





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the very best beta, [Tsoleil](http://archiveofourown.org/users/doctorqui), for their continued support. <3

Hanzo remembers how Jesse looks when he’s sleeping. He’s only ever seen him sleep on missions, but as with most things, he’s the kind of man who leaves an impression. Like a true old-fashioned cowboy, he’ll tip his ridiculous hat down over his eyes to block out the light, cross his legs in front of him with a quiet jingle of spurs, and fold his arms up under his serape. Hanzo has always been too restless to just nod off the way he does, but Jesse has turned catching a few minutes’ rest into an art form.

 

Hanzo sometimes envies the man’s easy sleep. On a few particularly stressful missions, he would have given almost anything to curl up the way Jesse does, to take advantage of the spare moments they have before the demands of their work catch up to them again.

 

But he does not envy Jesse this, Hanzo thinks, watching the shallow rise and fall of his chest against the stark white medbay sheets. Hanzo would suffer any number of sleepless nights if it meant that Jesse would open his eyes again. He’s suffered a few already.

 

He has seen Jesse in many a sorry state - bloody and bruised, too drunk to walk, laughing so hard he nearly lost his balance - but he has never seen him like this. Lifeless. Frail. His hair limp and stringy where it flares out around his head on the starched hospital pillow, framing his dull, lustreless face. Jesse McCree is not a man easily brought down; for all his apparent foolishness, he possesses a certain cunning and vitality that makes Hanzo glad they are on the same team.

 

Hanzo knows, from all of those missions where he’s witnessed Jesse napping on command, what he’s capable of, what he can do with only an old revolver and a lifetime of experience. Seeing him do nothing at all is like a knife twisting in his heart, a sorrowful clenching that has Hanzo curling his fists into the bed sheets next to Jesse’s hand.

 

He doesn’t hold it. He hasn’t earned the right. At this rate, it’s possible he never will.

 

~~~

 

It’s late evening on the third day when Genji joins him at Jesse’s bedside, slipping in so quietly that Hanzo almost doesn’t hear him. Genji has visited before, of course. Nearly everyone has, even Symmetra, who had stood at the foot of Jesse’s bed, frowning, unconsciously forming a ball of hard light between her fingers before the image shattered as she turned to leave.

 

He’d overheard her later, on the way to his room on Mercy’s orders, talking to Lúcio (another surprise, and perhaps if Hanzo hadn’t spent the last several months wondering what Jesse’s mouth would taste like against his own, he might’ve noticed all these other developments happening around him). She told him how Jesse had once risked his own life to save hers on a mission in Numbani, back before any of them had been particularly friendly towards the newly-arrived Vishkar agent. How he had made sure she was okay even after they returned to the Watchpoint. How she never expected a man like _him_ to take an interest in _her._

 

Hanzo knows the feeling. It coils fitfully in his gut at the sight of Jesse laying here, helpless.

 

Genji doesn’t say anything at first, but he stays longer than anyone else has, aside from Mercy. He’s surrounded by the same silence, broken only by the steady drip of Jesse’s IV and the whirr of the medical equipment. Hana had called the silence unnatural, when she’d stopped by, said that you could never usually get within ten feet of Jesse without being confronted by some type of noise.

 

Hanzo knows this feeling too. He thinks of all the times he’s scoffed at Jesse’s ridiculous antics, all the names he’s called him. He would take back every last one of them just to hear Jesse laugh again.

 

“You can do nothing for him like this, Hanzo,” Genji says suddenly, startling him out of his musings. “You are only hurting yourself.”

 

Hanzo doesn’t respond, but every muscle in his body is tense at the reminder of how useless he is here. He finds himself surprised once again when Genji’s hand comes up to rest on his arm, the cool metal of his armor a calming weight.

 

“He would not want you to sacrifice your well-being like this.”

 

For a moment, there is only the droning of the machines, the IV dripping, and the awful quiet. When Hanzo speaks, his voice is like sandpaper, rough with disuse.

 

“I did not learn.”

 

He sees the curious tilt of Genji’s head out of the corner of his eye.

 

“I thought I had changed. I thought I was doing what you had insisted I was capable of, that night in Hanamura. Forgiving myself. Choosing a side. Finding hope again.” Hanzo watches Jesse breathe, imagines the air passing through his parted, chapped lips - a reassurance that he still lives. “But in the end, I have not learned.”

 

“Hanzo…”

 

“I should have abandoned the mission,” he says, tearing his eyes away from the horrid immobility of Jesse’s body, looking down at the floor, at Genji’s hand on his arm, at Jesse’s hat where it rests next to his prosthetic on the side table. “I should have told Morrison to go to hell and take his orders with him. I should have saved him when I had the chance. It was the second of my two most terrible choices. The first was what I did to you.”

 

This time it’s Genji who doesn’t respond immediately. Hanzo closes his eyes, the bright lights of the medbay becoming suddenly too much for him to bear.

 

“And yet,” Genji says finally, “I am here. And so is Jesse. You are not to blame for what went wrong in Lijiang. And you should not give up hope now, when he needs it the most.”

 

Hanzo opens his eyes, watches the slow shift of movement beneath Jesse’s eyelids, wonders if he’s capable of dreaming in this state. Wonders what he dreams about.

 

“I should have told him.” His voice sounds feeble to his own ears, broken, entirely unlike himself. Even like this, Jesse has not stopped making him feel things he never expected. “Long ago.”

 

Genji’s metal fingers dig briefly into his arm in a comforting grip. “You will have the chance again, brother. Next time, do not waste it.”

 

~~~

 

Hanzo has only been asleep for a few hours, his body too tired for him to maintain his bedside vigil, when he's woken by the insistent pinging of his comm. He fumbles for it on the nightstand, all of his usual grace absent in the dim light of mid-morning. When he sees that it's a message from Mercy, he's instantly awake, his heart clenching in his chest.

 

The message is straight to the point: _He is awake._

 

Hanzo doesn't bother to change in his rush to get out the door. He'd fallen into bed wearing his clothes from yesterday, and they would just have to do.

 

The medbay is located in a building close to the helipad so that any mission injuries could be dealt with quickly, but it's nearly on the opposite side of the Watchpoint from the dormitories. Hanzo silently curses the distance, barely restrains himself from breaking into a run. He passes Mei and Zarya in a long, otherwise empty corridor, dressed in workout clothes on their way to the gym, but they take one look at his face and give him a wide berth. If even a tenth of what he's feeling is showing on his face, he doesn't blame them.

 

He has no idea what he’s going to say to Jesse when he gets there, if he’ll even be in any sort of state for a conversation at all. But Hanzo has to see him. Has to see those keen eyes open and hear that deep drawling voice, just to be sure.

 

It’s not until he gets to the medbay to find the small waiting room outside of it empty that he realizes Mercy likely hasn’t told the rest of the team yet - Mei and Zarya’s leisurely walk to the gym now makes more sense. He’s not sure what to think. How telling it is that Mercy would inform him before anyone else.

 

Perhaps she’s simply tired of Hanzo hanging around here day after day.

 

He takes a calming breath that barely helps the shaking of his hands at all before he presses the button to open the door. Two sets of eyes meet his as he steps through - Mercy’s, stopped in the middle of completing some kind of check of Jesse’s vitals, and Jesse’s, staring up at him from the same bed Hanzo had seen more of than his own for almost a week.

 

Relief rushes over him like an incoming tide. No matter what happens next, he thinks, no matter if Jesse blames him for what happened or if he makes an utter fool of himself, no matter if his feelings aren’t returned, he will remember this moment with joy. Knowing that Jesse lives will be enough, if it has to be.

 

Mercy resumes her check up as Hanzo hovers uncertainly halfway between the entrance and Jesse’s bed, drinking in the sight of him. Jesse’s eyes never leave his.

 

It doesn’t take long for Mercy to finish up. She glances over at Hanzo, face unreadable, before telling Jesse to, “Take it easy, I will be monitoring your vitals from my office. You’re going to be fine.”

 

“Thanks, Angie,” Jesse says, his voice even deeper than normal, scratchy from lack of use. “You’re the best.”

 

She gives Jesse a brief smile before making her way to the back to her office and closing the door behind her. The silence she leaves behind is tense, verging on awkward. Jesse still hasn’t stopped watching him.

 

Hanzo perches in the chair next to Jesse’s bed once again. Despite having spent so much time in it, it’s only now that he realizes how uncomfortable it is, hardly any cushion at all. His mind is clearer than it has been in days.

 

“So,” Jesse says, never one to allow the quiet to fester, “that mission went to hell, huh?”

 

“It did.”

 

“Angie didn’t really fill in many of the details. Last thing I ‘member was your report from the roof and gettin’ the signal from Morrison to go in…”

 

Hanzo sighs, looking away. A part of him wishes he could just hand Jesse the notes from the debrief and be done with it. But he owes Jesse this.

 

“Everything went fine at first. Lúcio had extracted most of the data by the time Talon reinforcements arrived. The team was taking heavy fire so Morrison ordered a retreat. I covered you as best I could, but Morrison kept insisting I head back to the airship…”

 

“From behind,” Jesse mutters, as if getting a sudden flash of the scene. “Someone we missed inside.”

 

“Yes. You were at the back of the group, making sure everyone got out. If I had stayed, I would have seen him...”

 

His voice fades away as Jesse shakes his head. “Ain’t your fault.”

 

“I didn’t--”

 

“Yeah, but I know you. How your brain works.” He taps the side of his head. “Ain’t your fault, darlin’. Ain’t nobody’s but mine for not payin’ attention.”

 

Hanzo purses his lips, doesn’t respond. There are several arguments he could make, but Jesse will surely be too stubborn to hear any of them.

 

“Don’t gimme that look,” Jesse says, his lips quirking up at the corner.

 

He makes a show of rolling his eyes, plays along with their familiar game. “I am not giving you a look.”

 

Jesse’s smile widens. It’s out of place, without the hat atop his head and against the backdrop of white, but it’s just as stunning as Hanzo remembers it. His answering grin, though it’s small and fades quickly, lifts a little of the weight from his chest.

 

“You know, Angie told me you were here every day, makin’ her job difficult.” Jesse’s eyes are tired but piercing as he stares up at him, as if Hanzo is an impossible puzzle that he refuses to stop trying to solve. “Didn’t realize you cared so much ‘bout lil ol’ me.”

 

Hanzo recognizes an opportunity when he sees it. And he thinks it should be harder than this, but the sheer relief of seeing Jesse _awake_ that still courses through his veins makes the words flow off his tongue without a second thought.

 

“I do care about you. Far too much, it seems.”

 

He relishes the wide-eyed look that crosses Jesse’s face, the way Hanzo’s words leave him speechless. Because Hanzo isn’t playing their game the way it’s supposed to be played, not anymore. Jesse teases, and flirts, and never commits - Hanzo grins and rolls his eyes, calls him an idiot, and never reciprocates.

 

No more, he thinks. He hears Genji’s voice like a distant echo, reminding him not to waste this chance. A lesson learned: mistakes will take all of your chances from you if you let them pass by.

 

“This is not the time nor the place for this conversation,” Hanzo says. “But I have allowed too much time to pass already. And we...hmm.” He smiles briefly, glances down at his hands, joined between his knees as he leans closer to Jesse, before meeting his eyes again. “We are so unconventional in every other sense, are we not? Perhaps the medbay is not so strange a location.”

 

Jesse laughs suddenly, the sound startled out of him, and Hanzo watches as he visibly relaxes into the thin hospital mattress. He hadn’t realized the tension was there until he saw the absence of it.

 

“Ain’t nothin’ normal ‘bout you and me, sugar.”

 

The words bring a smile to Hanzo’s face. “That is one of the things I found myself missing the most, while I sat here. Your ridiculous nicknames.”

 

“Always assumed they kinda annoyed you. Liked ‘em too much to stop usin’ ‘em though.”

 

“They do not annoy me.”

 

“So you won’t mind if I call you honeybun? Or sugarpie? Or cupcake? Or--”

 

“Why are these all desserts?” Hanzo says, laughing. “And stop interrupting me.”

 

“Oh, were you tryin’ to say somethin’?” Jesse looks positively devious, lounging against the pillows. Hanzo is sorely tempted to inform him how unflattering his hospital gown is.

 

“Indeed. I was trying to tell you that I am rather unfortunately in love with you. Although how this feeling persists through your incessant teasing is beyond me.”

 

The utter silence that follows reminds Hanzo a little too much of the particular type of quiet that filled the medbay while Jesse was asleep. Jesse is staring at him, eyes impossibly wide, his mouth hanging open slightly.

 

When Jesse finally speaks, his words are hesitant, lacking all the confidence and bluster he usually employs. “Did you...uh, didya say you--”

 

Hanzo raises an eyebrow at him. “Was that not what you were expecting when you were laying there grinning at me, listing off desserts?”

 

Jesse chuckles, reaching up to run a hand through his hair, grimacing at the texture of it. “Well, uh...I thought you were gonna ask me on a date, actually.”

 

“I suppose that might have been a more logical place to start,” Hanzo says, not meeting Jesse’s eyes. “After what happened, I could not...I understand if you do not share these feelings, and I apologize for springing this on you when you have just woken up--”

 

“Now, hold up.” Jesse sits up with some effort, slow without the use of his prosthetic, his body obviously still weak from the extended immobility. Hanzo reaches forward to steady him without thinking, but Jesse catches his hand before he can be of any help. He holds onto it as he says, “Goddamn, I gotta pick my words better, don’t I? What I shoulda said was, ‘I was hopin’ you’d ask me on a date so I could say _yes, absolutely._ ’”

 

Hanzo barely manages the muttered “Oh.” that leaves him, too flush with surprised happiness to say more. He smiles down at their joined hands.

 

“Hell, I love it when you smile like that,” Jesse says quietly, as if having an absent-minded revelation. “You gotta know - all that stuff I say? The nicknames, the cheesy lines? I wasn’t foolin’, not really. You been on my mind for so long, Hanzo…” Jesse laughs embarrassedly. “I mean, I wasn’t kiddin’ when I said all this was my own damn fault.”

 

At Hanzo’s curious frown, Jesse explains, “I demanded that Morrison get you out. You said you didn’t have much cover up there. All I could think about was makin’ sure you were safe.” He meets Hanzo’s stunned stare with a small smile. “Don’t regret it either. If you’d stayed to save my sorry ass and got hurt in the process…”

 

When he realizes the implications of Jesse’s words, the laughter that bubbles out of him catches both of them off-guard. He suppresses it long enough to say, “Nothing normal about you and I, indeed,” before Jesse is joining him, their quiet giggles echoing across the empty medbay.

 

He finds himself appreciating Jesse’s laugh more than he ever did before, as they slowly calm down. They share a charged look, teetering on the precipice of something bigger than they’ve ever faced before.

 

“So…” Jesse clears his throat, his eyes flicking down to Hanzo’s mouth in the least subtle movement Hanzo has ever seen. He’s tempted to roll his eyes again, but he’d rather take the offer when it’s handed to him.

 

“I would very much like to kiss you. But I do not want to cause you injury.”

 

“Darlin’, you can’t just go sayin’ that and then not go through with it.” Hanzo’s uncertainty must show on his face, because Jesse tugs him in impatiently by their joined hands. “You heard what Angie said: I ain’t goin’ nowhere. Now c’mere.”

 

And after everything, Hanzo doesn’t need much convincing at all to lean forward over the edge of Jesse’s bed, to cross that invisible line he had refused to cross every minute that he sat here. Jesse’s lips are chapped and dry, but Hanzo thinks he tastes heavenly when he tilts Jesse’s head up for a kiss.

 

It’s the worst possible setting for their first kiss, and definitely the worst timing. But Hanzo can’t bring himself to regret it when Jesse tightens his grip on his hand and leans up into him, trying to get as close as possible from the confines of the bed.

 

“When I get outta this bed,” Jesse says, a whisper against his lips, “I’m gonna give you a kiss you won’t believe.”

 

“I will look forward to it.”

 

Hanzo smiles, the promise of the future pushing the last remaining doubts from his mind. He presses their lips together in another sweet kiss, imagining what it will be like to do so again, and again, for as long as Jesse will have him.

 

And he’s grateful that tonight he will not fear falling asleep, now that Jesse is awake.

**Author's Note:**

> My amazing and beautiful friend drew [this amazing and beautiful art](http://lestatdelionasshole.tumblr.com/post/155836032397/drew-fanart-of-malevolentmango-s-fic-you-should) of Hanzo at Jesse's bedside! Check it out!
> 
> If you'd like to freak out about McHanzo with me, you can find me on tumblr [here](http://malevolentmango.tumblr.com).


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